« there will come a ruler whose brow is laid in thorn »
—
T
onight, I will go to the festival.
There is an old saying that there is no party like a Solterran one—and, while us of the Sun Court are well versed in our boasts, in this, at least, you must admit we are correct.
There is no party like a Solterran party.
The equinoctial festivals are the only events of the solar year where the rich and the poor mingle as one. It was custom, during the old days, for the masters of the house to shed their finery for plain white robes and seat their servants at their table, piled high with delicacies and an endless flow of spirits. The festival itself had been closer to bacchanalia than celebration, the streets running red with wine, children tucked to bed at sunset, white-robed lords and their ruby-clad mistresses stealing away in the haze of dusk like thieves, or a pair of young lovers.
I remember one spring festival I had made Mernatius sit at the head of our table. He had resisted, flustered, until I had pushed a fistful of grapes into his mouth, sealing it until he had swallowed. Father had looked on in amusement as he'd served Mernatius, and his father, chalices heavy with our finest wine, looking less like a lord in his plain linen robes and more like a man than I had ever seen him, his cheeks bright with blood, his smile less of a heavy thing.
The scene had delighted me, until Pilate had squalled from our mother's breast. I had sealed his mouth shut with a purple, syrupy fig.
The way to the markets are lit by thin black sconces that reach skywards in branchlike appendages, spiderwebbing into an arching canopy. Thimble-sized candles flicker within each knot, a thousand beating hearts. Wax drips down in clumping white tear-lines, staining a festival-goer's clean linens.
Pearl-shaped sapphires fall in gold chains down my brow and chest. They clink together like bells as I walk, pushed along by the rowdy procession. Some already hold wineglasses, brought, I assume, from home.
The last time I had worn such finery had been at my father's burial.
Soon, the first of the vendors' brightly coloured stalls loom over the widening path. I do not know which one to stop at, so I stop at none and continue being swept along, like a pauper prince. So far I have not been recognised. I have yet to decide if I am disheartened or not.
A dark figure tugs the edge of a pale cape loftily past me, and I wonder if it is Pilate. Long ago we had come to these festivals together.
My lips lift into a sneer. Long ago is not long ago enough.
breathe a sigh of relief when the full moon comes and goes without interrupting the Autumn Festival. It is expected of me to go, eldest son of the Sevettan household, representative and heir to the Solterran blacksmith empire. But to go out on a full moon… well, by his light that is not a problem.
The servants dress me for the evening, and one reaches for a beautiful necklace, golden, embossed, a family heirloom. “No,” I say, “the turquoise.” The pair glance uncertainly at each other. I know mother would prefer I wear the choker. It is a reflection of our status, she would say.
They place the turquoise around my neck anyway, and the stones settle cooly against my skin. “Perfect,” I tell them, though there are no mirrors in my room. I know they are bright and striking against my sand colored coat, anyway, and I feel better with their weight just above my heart.
•••
The streets are bustling, full of equines from the highest houses to the most modest of folks. It’s a party quite unlike any I have seen in a long time, since the festivals stopped being held years ago.
I am careful to step lightly, with grace; to smile pleasantly, to mind my satins and my manners. I am the image of Solterran nobility. My mother would be proud.
Ahead, my eyes land upon a familiar face. Chiseled, bronze in the flickering light. Still beautiful. I feel sick, immediately, and turn away hoping he hasn’t noticed me. I look back once, but his eyes are cast elsewhere. I can’t decide if that is relief or pain I feel.
That is when I see him. Oh, anyone who is anyone knows of and would recognize the Ieshan brothers. Dark little Corradh, exotic Pilate, magnificent—
“Prince Adonai, light be with you.”
I’m not sure if I am trying to save myself from the man behind me, or save him from whatever is causing that unfortunate look upon his face. I decide that perhaps both will do, but oh, if it is Adonai, Head of House Ieshan, who I need to save me… Solis, grant me strength.
« there will come a ruler whose brow is laid in thorn »
—
I
am about to lose heart—how quickly Solterra forgets—when a voice cuts through the dark like one of Apollo's arrows.
"Prince Adonai, light be with you."
It is difficult, and then impossible, to stifle the swell of affection that spreads like thick broth through my bones for this voice that addresses me not only by title, but by Solis' light.
It means that it knows me. Not the me now, but the me then. Proud Adonai, Cleric of Virtue. When I close my eyes I can almost see him. Me. If I play everything right no one will notice the difference.
Slowly I turn the direction my ears, unsure as they are, flutter towards like flags. I tell myself that the dragging pace is forgivable. That the ghoulish cast of the candles plunges everyone into sallowness, making mine as much a costume as the next. In the dark, eyes turn into hollow sockets. Pupils bloom belladonna black. Skins stretch tight over the gullies of ribs.
In the dark, my shadow remains unchanging.
I walk forwards a step and then another, until what had once been a hazy, dreamlike form gathers into cheekbones cut in sharp relief and ears as long and slender as a doe's.
"Light be with you," I repeat, as solemn as a disciple. By the time my tongue sinks back behind my teeth I know who it is that has called me prince.
"Amunemhet."
Firstborn of the House of Smiths, once nearly our equals in esteem and wealth; the War has ravaged them almost as completely as it has the Hajakhas. Still, they were—and continue to be, if the scraps of hearsay I am allowed to hear are as accurate as they are snide—strong contenders for an Ieshan alliance.
We had hunted together as boys. I remember the brightness of his hair, silver snow in a tide of raven-haired children as we polished our bows and laced up our oiled armour, House crests burned into the leather, our collective silence betraying our fear as lords and ladies (our mothers and fathers) watched from their silk pillows which of their stock would sink the first arrow into the wicked teryr's flesh.
It had been mine, struck neatly through a dinner-plate eye.
Amunemhet had been in Pilate's year, slender as a willow branch even then. Now, we are nearly of a height, his limbs supple and bronze while mine, pale as wax candles, encroach daily further upon the realm of gauntness. I can no longer draw tight a bow. I can barely tune the strings of my lyre.
But I am still draped in a hundred sapphires, and my smile is still just as quick. "It's been far too long, Sevetta."
e turns toward me, speaking my blessing back in my direction. I am not sure if it pleases me, or not. It should, but I know he does not understand the weight of it. He does not understand the truth of it. I’m certain he has not read the Good Book that I have, that has given me new insight into Solis’ word and guidance. It’s okay, I remind myself. I am fortunate to be blessed. I must look kindly on all others, regardless of whether they are or not.
The Ieshans, at least, are known for their piety. It is a quality I respect them for, and one I can forgive when Adonai speaks those hallowed words back at me.
Adonai turns toward me—slowly, that I am almost convinced I’m imagining the speed of it because of the way the candlelight frames his waxen skin, warms his almost-silver eyes. Solis’ mercy, I think, feeling my heart race a little at the sight of him. We are not children any longer, and he is laden with jewels that would make my mother’s eyes gleam sharply. The way he says my name is a sin to my ears.
I should not be standing here.
I press a hand against the turquoise at my throat, glancing skyward, though I know I will find no sun there to comfort me. Curse this nighttime festival, and it’s waning moon. “It has been a long time, Ieshan,” I repay the smile with one of my own.
This is a game that I can play well, I have been doing it for my entire life. It takes everything in me not to glance back over my shoulder just to see. I only want to know, has he noticed me? Is he still there? It bothers me that I care so much, even now. I remind myself not to fiddle with my stones. It is not becoming of a noble to fidget, mother would say.
“You are the last face I expected to see out here tonight,” I assert, locking dark gold eyes back upon Adonai’s fine-boned features, “Do you enjoy being elusive, then?” The eldest Ieshan son is, in fact, the only one I can’t recall seeing out, about the court. Of course, is that really different from our lives as children?
I know well what it’s like, to be chained into your studies, to be expected certain things of you. I try not to think about the burnished, gold man who might still be behind me. And I do not pretend to know what has happened in Adonai’s life, while he’s been kept away (keeping himself away?). Sometimes I would like to be away, but my duties are to the family business, and the family business is in the heart of Solterra.
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